Blue Bird
by 10catsallpiledtogetherinspace
Summary: The Doctor takes to listening to Yaz's singing to help her relax. It's a very effective insomnia treatment, she finds, until the Tardis starts to meddle, and things get complicated.
1. The Doctor

When the Doctor took to repairing the Tardis, she didn't just work on repairing the engine.

Yes, that was what she liked to do most, but she also took to wandering the halls, making little changes. She would often move rooms around, create and design rooms, and make little changes here and there to the décor.

The Doctor did this when her companions were asleep. She didn't want to move when they were awake, as the rocking would surely wake them.

It had been about six hours since she had last seen her companions, and was trying to locate the Tardis greenhouse. She didn't remember when she had moved it, but she had rounded the past corner twice now, and it was nowhere to be found.

Suddenly, as she was making what was her eighth left turn, she heard a sound echoing through the halls. She jumped.

It sounded like singing.

She pondered this for a moment. It could have been one of her companions playing music, but they should have all been asleep by now. The Tardis surely wouldn't be playing any.

The Doctor pressed forward, curious about source of the sound.

Finally she arrived at Yaz's room.

Now this was odd. This hadn't ever happened before, at least not that she could remember. The door was slightly open.

She knocked. No answer. She knocked again, softer this time, pushing the door open slightly with her knuckles.

Yaz's things were strewn around the room. There was a pile of clothes on her chair, a tower of books on her nightstand, including a couple from her future. The Doctor made a mental note to confiscate those later on. The door to Yaz's bathroom was slightly cracked open, steam seeping through the opening.

Oh!

Yaz was singing.

The Doctor didn't really recognize it. It seemed like a pop song, something recent from her time. For a moment she just stood there, taking in the sound of Yaz's voice. She felt stuck in the best way, compelled to just stand there and take in the noise. She let her eyes close of their own accord, feeling at peace.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when she heard the water stop. She bolted out of the room as fast as she could.

She had been _listening to Yaz shower_. No matter how she sliced it, that was one of the weirdest things she had done so far in this regeneration. She pressed herself into the wall of the Tardis steadying her rapidly beating hearts, and then began to make her way to the kitchen. She needed tea.

The second time it happened it was in the kitchen. They had just taken a trip to the 1920's. Yaz had insisted on seeing a real jazz club, so the Doctor flashed her psychic paper and they became VIP's. Graham had resigned himself to chatting with another shady looking man at the bar. In the meantime, Yaz and Ryan went to town on the dance floor, much to the Doctor's jealousy. Not that she would ever admit to being jealous.

Eventually they stopped just in time to save the Doctor from dying her hair black.

Once they had gotten back to the Tardis, Yaz was holding her shoes and they were all out of breath from having been chased by a mafia member. Turns out Graham's friend was working for the mob.

Once again, it was 'late' at night on the Tardis. Yaz, Ryan and Graham had gone to bed hours ago, but just as the Doctor began walking back from the zero gravity room after a couple repairs, she heard the singing again.

"Blue birds, singing a song… Nothing but blue skies from now on."

Gingerly, the Doctor peeked her head into the kitchen. Yaz seemed to be making cocoa, swaying back and forth, singing to herself. She was wearing a large purple sweater that almost covered her sleep shorts. Her hair was slightly damp, falling down at her sides in swirls. The Doctor watched as she moved back and forth. She tried to take in every detail, to hold that moment in her head. She was feeding off the calm bliss.

Suddenly Yaz turned to sit at the table, eyes skimming right over the Doctor.

The Doctor whipped her head back, slamming against the door frame. She bit her lip to keep from wincing, slapping her hand to cover where a bruise would soon be forming. Blood rushed to her cheeks. There was a slight pause in the singing, much to the Doctor's chagrin, but soon, it started up again. She heard the tinkle of a spoon against a cup.

"Noticing the days hurrying by… When you're in love, my how they fly…"

Every rational thought the Doctor had was telling her to leave. She had work to do and this was wrong. It was creepy. And yet her feet stayed planted to the spot, leaning against the door frame, eyes closed. She stayed that way for a moment more before finally willing her feet to leave.

The Doctor slept sometimes, between repairs and adventures. She had a bedroom, although it was rarely used. Mostly she slept in either the library or a hanging sling she kept under the Tardis console.

The Doctor knew objectively that she needed sleep. She couldn't- No, she wouldn't sleep. She refused. She knew all sleep would bring would be bad dreams. Working on the Tardis console, all she could see was the face of Prem in her mind's eye. She could hear the gunshot in hear ears like it had happened not a second ago.

Even as her eyes began to droop, she tried her best to keep them open, even going so far as to spark pieces of the Tardis up on purpose just to keep her attention. She tried to ignore the Tardis's enraged chirps as much as she could.

She leaned back in her sling, studying the mess in front of her. Suddenly it became too big, too much. The wires weaving back and forth in front of one another made her anxious, almost angry. She turned away from the task at hand for a moment, letting her eyes fall shut, trying desperately to get the image of her dead friend out of her head and just barely succeeding.

She took another look at the wires. She could always just cut through them all and solder them together again. The Tardis gave an alarmed beep. The Doctor just sighed and leaned forward, before she heard a quiet echo.

More singing, except this time it wasn't coming from anywhere, in particular. The music was being projected inside her head. It was a sad song, but that was all she could tell. It could have been modern or old, but its melody soothed her. She heard her sonic hit the floor with a loud clang and jolted forward. She reached down to grab it, eyebrows furrowed, mentally scolding at the Tardis over the sound of the song.

She couldn't do this. She couldn't just steal Yaz's voice and shove it into the Doctor's head. Singing was a private thing. On some countries it was indecent to be caught singing in public.

The Tardis was quick to point out how she sang for the Doctor on more than one occasion. Often after particularly difficult days the Tardis would construct a melody out of different wavelengths of the rift energy she ran on, projecting the different frequencies into the Doctor's head.

To an outside observer, the Doctor would look absolutely mad, blushing and making faces at nothing, but in her head, she was arguing vehemently that _this was different_ and that _Yaz was her friend_.

The Doctor heard the Tardis make a noise that sounded suspiciously like a laugh before going silent.

Half out of annoyance, the Doctor once again raised her screwdriver, only to be swatted back by a shower of sparks and a resurgence of the singing at full force.

"Okay! Fine!" She yelped out loud to the machine, leaning back into her sling and the sound of Yaz's voice.

The next time she closed there was no echoing gunshot, just the sound of Yaz's singing. She pictured Yaz on that hillside, singing into the night air with that dandelion in her hair. She wanted to reach out braid it, just for the sake of touching it. If she concentrated hard enough, she could almost imagine the feeling of her hands in Yaz's hair. She sunk further into her sling, wanting to make the feeling last. Soon enough she was asleep.

At first, she tried to feign annoyance. She would be in the middle of making a snack, or repairs, and she would start to hear singing. Soon after the singing started she would find herself asleep.

She was in the bath this time. It had been a while since she had ran a bath, mostly opting for quick showers. She decided to break out one of her special glow in the dark bath bombs she made special. It left dust on her fingers and she shivered, remembering how she had glowed in the dark for a week after her first attempt at making one of the little things.

She sank gratefully into the water. It had been a long day of running and her bones sighed when she sat down. She leaned her head back and closed her eyes.

Suddenly she jolted forward. She had promised to herself that she was going to rewire the lighting in the game room.

Sitting in the warm water, her whole body complained with the effort of getting up. True, rewiring lighting was not her favorite part of Tardis repairs, but it had to get done. She was sure she had seen lights flickering in there.

Just before she could rise out of the tub, the singing started up again. She tensed, frozen in the water. She pondered telling the Tardis to stop, but she knew the box wouldn't listen. After a couple of beats, she resigned herself to her fate.

The Doctor breathed in time to the words. She recognized them. Yaz sang this song particularly often it seemed.

The song flowed through here like honey, better than any sleep medicine or relaxant she had ever tried.

Exactly one hour and sixteen minutes later, the Doctor woke up, and the bathwater was cold.

A week later, for the first time ever, the Doctor actually asked. The Tardis, it seemed, had resigned itself to projecting the singing into the Doctor's head when she wanted her to relax, or to get her to stop a task. The Doctor had finally caught on to this the night in the bath. This time was different.

They were on a planet devoted to skating. Ice skating, roller skating, even skateboarding. Ryan had been less than thrilled about this, not just due to his illness, but because Graham seemed to be reliving his skating days. He had begun to use slang as well, which the Doctor had quickly adopted. Ryan and Yaz hadn't stopped cringing.

It hadn't stayed light hearted. They were in the nosebleeds box of a hockey rink, one of the many on the planet. They were enjoying their dinner when it had locked down. They were given a choice.

One button killed everyone in the stadium, and the other killed them.

And they had thirty minutes.

The first fifteen were spent negotiating with their captor, the owner of the stadium. Some crazy young kid who wanted to see the effects of mental stress on different species. He was especially interested when he found out the Doctor was a Time Lord.

The next five minutes after that were spent figuring out what exactly the murder tactic was going to be.

As soon as the Doctor had realized it was gas, she began slowly draining the reserves. Such a small amount wouldn't kill the stadium full, it would just put them to sleep. However, that same amount in their box could easily take them out.

She had to press the button to kill the stadium.

And she couldn't tell Ryan, Graham or Yaz that she didn't commit mass murder.

Graham looked shocked. Eyes wide, staring over the stadium of once lively people. He barely breathed. He was frozen.

Ryan was more vocal. He took to screaming frantically at the Doctor.

"What the hell did you do that for!?"

He grabbed at the Doctors shoulders, tears threatening to fall from his eyes. He shook her, almost trying to will the Doctors conscientious back into her by force.

"Stop. Ryan, leave her alone."

Yaz's hand landed on Ryan's shoulder. She was trying to keep a strong image, but her wobbling voice gave it away.

The Doctor locked eyes with her.

The Doctor saw many familiar things in her gaze. Anguish, mourning, shock. The thing that hit her the hardest, that made her feel the worst was fear. Unconcealed fear.

Yaz was terrified. Yaz was terrified of _her._

When the door opened they all scrambled out of the box as fast as they could. Soon after the situation was explained and the owner was dealt with, but their faces, their reactions.

The _fear._

The Doctor couldn't shake it. She couldn't move. She laid back on the library floor in front of the fire place, book half read on her stomach, unable to do anything. All she could do was let he guilt wash over her.

She sat up, throwing the book to the ground with a roar, fresh tears threatening to fall from her eyes. The self-pity wasn't helping her.

She closed her eyes for a moment. She focused on the hum of the ship, and it helped slow her breathing. A few beats later, she made a silent request.

 _If Yaz was singing somewhere, would the Tardis mind…?_

Yaz wasn't singing per se. Her words came out mumbled and squished together, hums and gibberish.

It was exactly what the Doctor needed. She couldn't even muster the energy to feel ashamed. She closed her eyes and imagined Yaz next to her, singing into her ear, just holding her.

She fell asleep two minutes later.

Soon after this, the tradition of listening to Yaz via the Tardis became a sort of ritual. Whenever she wanted to relax, she would close her eyes, and the Tardis would project Yaz's songs into her head whenever possible.

At some point she realized the Tardis was recording Yaz's voice to play for her later. She quickly found where the Tardis was keeping those files and put them onto an old mp3 player. Now, instead of having to ask Tardis every time she needed to relax, the Doctor slipped on headphones.

She had even begun to keep the mp3 player in her pocket on adventures. If she needed to work on something, she would slip her earphones in and tuck in. This proved slightly detrimental on long projects, as after a while the Doctor would begin to fall asleep.

Then, the Tardis and the Doctor got into a row.

The Tardis had nearly crashed into Mars. Her companions had just gone to sleep and she was trying to fly as quietly as possible. She was succeeding before she felt a slight rumbling, which slowly turned into intense turbulence. After a couple of hours of fixing the monument she _had_ crash landed into and placating her rudely awoken pajama clad friends, she got back onto the Tardis, yelling angrily.

"You could have killed us!" The Doctor yelled up at the ceiling.

Ryan and Graham exchanged a look, and walked right by the Doctor, quickly washing their hands of the situation and heading back to bed.

Yaz hesitated for a moment, watching the Doctor argue with her ship before deciding it was best to take the side of the ship. She walked away, patting the wall of the Tardis slightly as if to say 'I don't blame you.'

The Tardis made a series of angry noises. It seemed she didn't believe this was her fault.

 _How could this possibly be my fault?!_ The Doctor shouted at the Tardis in her head, frowning.

She was shown a mental image of the mp3 player. The Doctor blushed.

 _I don't see what that has to do with you nearly crashing into Mars._

She was shown another image. It was her, flying the Tardis, earphones in her ears and- Oh, was she really holding down the red button instead of the green that whole time?

 _Sorry._ The Doctor conceded. _But you really could have helped a bit more._

The Tardis had no response. The Doctor absentmindedly looked for the offending music player. She was sure she had put it just there, by the spinning hourglass.

She patted down her person, nothing. She began to search the whole console. As soon as she reached looking beneath the custard cream peddle, there it was.

The Doctor gave the Tardis a dirty look. _You did that on purpose, didn't you?_

The Tardis was eerily silent.

When she turned the device on, she was met with a sinister screen.

 _Device Re-Formatted._

"Oh, no, no, no!"

The Doctor smacked the device with her hand in a futile attempt to get the files back.

"You did this!" The Doctor yelped, pointing an accusing finger at the Tardis ceiling.

No response.

"Fine. That's fine! I don't need it anyway. I have work to do." The Doctor huffed, storming off.

They had stayed like that for about three days. The Doctor wasn't communicating with the Tardis at all, the ship just wouldn't talk. The Doctor couldn't sleep either. It seems she'd become slightly dependent on the sound of Yaz's voice. Whenever she tried to sleep, she just tossed and turned.

Even when she wasn't trying to sleep, whenever she tried to pilot the ship, it would rumble and shake the whole team completely off course.

The team finally thought they were safe when the Tardis had dropped them off at an innocent looking forest. They only later found out that the forest was filled with angry monkey creatures.

The Doctor slammed the door shut behind her, feeling the bodies of the apes pressing up against the door. She quickly latched it shut, breathing a sigh of relief.

"Alright, what the hell is going on?" Graham seemed to be the first to catch on.

"I dunno what you mean." The Doctor smiled, trying to feign ignorance.

"We just got attacked by monkeys! Proper rabid ones! And before, with the ice planet-"Ryan was cut off.

"I told you, the resort we were supposed to land at was just on the other side of the hemisphere."

"Ok, but what about the garbage planet." Ryan countered.

"He's got a point Doctor. It seems like, well, are you and the Tardis alright?" Yaz asked.

"Of course we're alright, aren't we old girl!" The Doctor slapped her hand against the console, sending sparks and a puff of smoke flying.

"I knew it, you two are having a row." Graham was smug, satisfied in his conclusion.

"We are not having a row! She's just being temperamental." The Doctor grumbled the last bit half to the Tardis, which let out another shower of sparks. "Very temperamental."

"You need to have a talk, just the two of you. We're not leaving until you do. 'Sides, I need to sit down after all that runnin'." Graham said resolutely.

"Ryan, Yaz." Graham led them out of the console room and deeper into the Tardis, leaving the Doctor alone with her ship.

Both the Doctor and the ship stayed quiet for a while. The Doctor sighed, leaning against the console, trying to give her the silent treatment. The Doctor broke first, unsurprisingly.

"I'm sorry. I should have been more careful."

A slight mental scolding came from the Tardis.

"I know okay! I'm sorry I messed up flying you!"

Another annoyed beeps.

"And I'm sorry I keep screwing up the dishwasher, but it does make weird noises now and then."

The Tardis went silent, and there was a pregnant pause.

"So, d'you forgive me?" The Doctor asked sheepishly.

The Tardis made a noise like a laugh, and the console room lit up. The Doctor jumped to her feet and laughed in excitement.

She spotted the mp3 player leaning up against one of the levers. She eagerly grabbed for it, turning it on.

Her face fell when she saw that it was still empty.

She frowned, leaning her head against the console, squeaking, "You couldn't have just filled it back up for me?"

There was no response from the Tardis this time, so the Doctor sighed, and sank down to begin some small repairs.

About five minutes later, a familiar voice filled her head. It cut through the Doctor like butter, making her get to her feet.

 _Thank you!_

The Doctor smiled contentedly at the ceiling, which chirped in response.

She felt a tug at her mind, telling her feet to move forward. She was so entranced that she just let herself follow it like a sirens call.

Finally, she arrived back at Yaz's door. She leaned against the wall just outside, happy to hear the voice again after so long a hiatus.

Slowly, she began to sink down the wall to sit against it. She hadn't slept in three days, but between the mental strain of fighting with the Tardis and trying to repair things that didn't want to be repaired, she was bloody _exhausted._

She supposed it couldn't hurt to close her eyes, just for a moment.


	2. Yasmin Khan

Yaz was an insomniac. She'd been that way since she was young. Bedtime was always a chore for her. A piece of what made traveling with the Doctor so amazing was that 'bedtime' didn't really have a 'time'. It was almost like a social pressure being lifted. She was in a state of limbo, but in a good way.

So, really, she wasn't at all disturbed when the Tardis slammed into that monument to whatsit or other. Well, besides her nail polish getting everywhere. She also sort of expected it, considering the Doctors driving.

What she didn't expect that day was opening her bedroom door to a passed out Time Lord.

At first, Yaz honestly thought she had knocked her head on something and passed out, but she looked pretty comfortable to have just dropped.

Yaz knelt in front of her. No one was around, so she just sort of _stared._ The Doctor certainly wasn't going to notice. It was rare to see the Doctor so calm. Time froze. She could wake the Doctor up at any time and pretend that she had just found her lying there. There wasn't any rush to wake her up, though.

The Doctor wasn't completely still. Even in sleep she had her tics. Every once and awhile her nose would scrunch up slightly, or her eyes would twitch. She would make the smallest sigh and it would ring loudly in Yaz's ears.

It was the first time she'd seen her sleep since she'd fallen from the sky. The first time though, she looked in distress. Not so now. She looked young, not like a two thousand year old space alien. Her body seemed to possess a galactical grace. She was almost ethereal. Like she was glowing.

Yaz slowly lifted her hand up, tracing the air just above the Doctor's facial features. Her nose, her eyes, her cheekbones.

She let out a small gasp and froze when she heard a beep come from the Doctor's pocket.

Slowly and carefully, she dropped her hand and extracted a small music player from the Doctor's coat. She read the blinking letters on the screen.

 _Data Recovered._

A small grin grew on her face. She had seen the Doctor with the device before. More and more often Yaz had spotted her doing some menial task, completely in her own world with her ear pods in.

She knew it might be a little wrong to be listening like this, but she couldn't help being curious as to what music the Doctor liked. She knew that the alien had taken a liking to the human race, but she wanted to see what off world music was like.

Yaz was absentmindedly wondering what future music from earth would sound like as she waltzed into her room. Reaching for her headphones in her drawer, it quickly shut, nearly pinching her hand.

"Hey!" Yaz whisper-yelled to the Tardis, which only gave a sympathetic, yet anxious whine in return. When she went to open the drawer again, she found her headphones were impossibly tangled. Yaz rolled her eyes, taking one tangled half and plugging it into the device, and pressing one of the sides of her headphones to her ears.

She stood for a moment, deciding what song to pick. None of them were labeled, most just had a string of random numbers as a title. There were about a total of twenty songs stored away. She decided to pick the thirteenth at random.

She nearly dropped the device as soon as the audio came through.

Yaz had been encouraged to sing since birth. Her parents were always very supportive, coming to every one of her recitals and talent shows. She joined choir and musical theater and loved it. That was, until she began high school.

There was this instructor who was notoriously cruel. Her and her band of golden students ran the drama department. Yaz barely got in when she tried out. They told her she could be 'trained' into a good vocalist. Turns out her 'training' involved being picked at relentlessly. Every song she sung, every note that came out of her mouth wasn't good enough.

They critiqued her voice, her style, and the way they critiqued her weight was particularly bad. She had lost almost twenty pounds from the stress by the end of her first two months on the team.

Her mother had finally put a stop to it by the end of the school year, but the damage had already been done. Yaz had stopped singing altogether.

It had taken her a while to begin again. She still never sang in front of anyone. However, in the rare chance that she was home alone, she would sing to herself.

That was another perk of being on the Tardis. She could sing as loud and as much as she wanted and no one would hear. At least that was what she thought. Until now.

She was feeling a myriad of emotions. Mostly anxiety. Her hands were shaking as she wrenched the headphones off her head. A moment later a sleepy Doctor made her way into the room.

"Yaz…?" She croaked, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

Yaz's mouth was still open, her breath coming out in harsh puffs.

"You've been- What- Why?" Yaz finally settled on a question leaning back on her bureau to stabilize herself.

The Doctor took a moment to fully realize the situation before the shock set in.

"Yaz, you weren't supposed to see that."

"So you were just going to keep doing this and not tell me?!" Yaz snapped.

All those years ago in high school, right before her mother had taken her out of the drama club, Yaz had tried out for a musical. It was going to be one of the largest in the school's history. They were partnering with a real theatre in Sheffield to preform it.

She had stepped onto the stage and her eyes met the barrel of a camera. When she asked about it, she had been told it was just going to be used to review the different auditions, as there had been many, and could she please get on with it?

Not two days later, that video had been posted everywhere. There wasn't a student in the school who hadn't seen Yaz on stage, making a right fool of herself, trying out for the part of comic relief.

She didn't go to school for days. She shut herself in her bedroom and just cried. No one could get through to her.

"Yaz? Are you in there?" The Doctor had been saying something, but Yaz hadn't been listening.

"Take me home" Yaz mumbled, eyes glued to the floor.

The Doctors face fell even more than it already had.

"What?"

Yaz breathed a steadying breath, and locked her eyes with the Doctor's.

"Just for a week. I need to-"She didn't finish the justification. "Take me home."

"Okay. I understand. No problem." The Doctor murmured under her breath, trying to look anywhere but Yaz.

The Doctor had kicked out a sleepy Graham and Ryan as well as Yaz it seemed, because soon after she had arrived home Ryan was back posting on snapchat about all of the new trinkets he had picked up on their travels.

It had been three days since the Doctor had dropped them back off. Yaz had begun to realize that a week in Sheffield was a lot longer than a week in space.

She had to deal with her job. It seemed she was permanently demoted at this point, considering she had up and disappeared for a week.

Her parents and sister would _not_ stop asking questions. Where had she been? What had she been doing? Was she with that Doctor again? Where did she get that earing and why was it changing colors?

She tried to grin and bear it, keeping as tightlipped as possible, but the more that they asked about what she had been doing, the more she had to _think_ about what she had been doing.

She missed the Doctor.

At first she was angry. She was scared and angry and more than anxious about the recordings. Even she couldn't deny that it was weird, even by the Doctor's standards.

The more and more she thought about it, though, she realized the Doctor wasn't out to get her. She'd evidently been listening to the recordings for a long time. She wasn't in high school anymore. The Doctor wouldn't have been doing this to make fun of her.

She pondered for a long time about the Tardis's involvement in the whole thing. The cupboard slamming on her, her headphones coming out tangled. As strange as the ship was, she usually had a pretty good moral compass. She had no problem letting the Doctor be punished for her mistakes. So why would she be covering for her?

Unless the Tardis was the one doing the recording the whole time.

It would make sense. The Doctor had the stealth of a drunk elephant. There would be no way of getting such a crisp recording unless she had been right next to her. She was sure that she would have discovered the Doctor much sooner had that been the case.

Yes, she would need to have a talk about privacy with both the Doctor _and_ the Tardis, but when she was there, on the ship, with the Doctor, that was when she was home.

She cared about the Doctor too much to let her go that easily.

So at two am the next Sunday, when she heard the sound of the Tardis engine, she abandoned making her second cup of hot chocolate, grabbed her coat, and nearly sprinted out the door in her bedclothes.

She spotted the Doctor from behind the Tardis console, surrounded by a pile of junk. The whole room seemed to be in a state of slight disarray. She quickly sprung to her feet, galloping her way over to Yaz and smiling behind the goggles she was wearing.

"Yaz! Hello, did I get the timing right?"

"Almost too right actually, you dropped me off at this time fifteen minutes ago last week." Yaz said, beginnings of a smile appearing on her face.

"Brilliant! Perfect, okay." The Doctor chirped, buzzing with energy.

The Doctor gripped Yaz's shoulders. "Wait." She mumbled to herself before extracting a hand, pulling up her goggles and replacing it. Now she was looking straight at Yaz.

They were impossibly close. It would only take a step for Yaz to-

"Yaz." The Doctor began lowly. "I know what I did was wrong and creepy. I'm sorry."

She paused again, looking up at the ceiling. Just as Yaz was about to respond, she was intruded.

"Oh, the Tardis is sorry too! She says she'll never do it again." The Doctor spoke up a little at this beginning to tap her fingers against her back, and the Tardis gave an apologetic hum.

Something was off.

The Doctor kept smiling but it wasn't reaching her eyes. Her hair was more tangled than Yaz had ever seen it, and her eyes had dark bags underneath them.

"Doctor, it's okay, I get it. Singing is just a sore spot for me. I'm sorry I didn't-"

"Yes, because of the play, right?" The Doctor blurted, retreating back to the console.

"Yeah. Wait how d'you know about the play?" Yaz questioned suspiciously, following the Doctor.

"Well, your mom told me a week from now in your time." The Doctor mumbled. "Should I not have asked? I just wanted to make sure I knew what was wrong and that you weren't-" The Doctor rubbed her shoulders.

"It's okay for now, just- In the future, don't talk to my mom without me unless I know, okay?"

"Yes, of course. Anything." The Doctor looked Yaz straight in the eye and reached out to grab her hand, squeezing it like she would disappear at any moment.

"So! I've been thinking, I'm gonna take you anywhere you want to go. Think of it as a not-going-away present." The Doctor grinned as she dragged Yaz along, practically vibrating with energy. She was flipping switches and buttons as she walked, kicking up empty coffee cups and metal parts.

"I realize that it might be a bit overwhelming so I've picked out a few places for you that I think you'll enjoy." A hologram of a couple of different places appeared, circling the Tardis console. The Doctor removed her hand from Yaz's spun the choices with her finger.

"Anything look interesting?" The Doctor grinned looking a little smug with the display

Yaz was taken momentarily with the light show, spinning the different places, watching as they lit up. She was smiling when turned to the Doctor.

The Time Lord had a smile etched onto her face, but she looked anxious. All previous smugness was gone. Her eyes were searching Yaz's face for any sort of response.

"Thank you so much for this Doctor, but-" The Doctor's face fell, eyes becoming frantic.

"Sorry, do you not see anything you like? I could work on another menu for you. There's so many planets out there we could see together." She grabbed Yaz's hand again, tugging it slightly.

"Doctor, it's wonderful, but are you okay?" The Doctor's face relaxed a little.

"Of course I'm okay, what makes you say that?" The Doctor said with ease.

"You look… off. When was the last time you slept?" Yaz was hesitant, she was trying to question the Doctor softly.

"Oh you know, not since you left." The Doctor said casually.

"What!?" Yaz exclaimed. She was shocked.

"Time Lords need less sleep than humans do, I'm totally fine." The Doctor tried to sound encouraging, but she stumbled on something, nearly falling over as Yaz caught her by the shoulder, hoisting her back up.

"Doctor, it's been a week!" Yaz yelped.

"A month." The Doctor began. "It's been a week for you."

"Doctor!" Yaz was properly worried now.

"I told you Yaz, I'll be fine."

Yaz took a couple breaths, trying to steady herself.

"Why didn't you go to bed this whole time?" Yaz tried to fill her question with concern rather than shock.

"Couldn't sleep. 'Sides, I had work to do, didn't I?"

It clicked.

The Doctor hadn't slept because of her.

Yaz gaped like a fish for a moment, before the Doctor tipped over, landing on her shoulder, and leaning against her.

"You have to sleep." Yaz stood firm.

"Told you, can't." The Doctor mumbled against Yaz's shirt.

Yaz hesitated for a moment.

"I'll help. Just go and get ready. I'll find you in a minute." Yaz stuttered as the Doctor pulled back to look her in the eye. Her expression was mostly unreadable.

"Okay." The Doctor sprinted off.

Yaz appeared in the Doctors room ten minutes later holding two cups of warm milk. It wasn't what she had expected. It was simple, but filled with items and trinkets from here and there. The Doctor was sitting in the middle of the bed, legs crossed. Her hair, wet from the shower, was getting her usual t-shirt slightly damp. She was wearing sweatpants.

Yaz hadn't really seen the Doctor so disrobed before. It felt almost indecent. Yaz's cheeks were tinted pink as she handed the Doctor her mug.

The Doctor blew on it a bit before taking a sip. She gave a content smile, looking into Yaz's eyes.

"Thanks, for this Yaz."

Yaz blushed even harder, looking down at the space between them.

"My pleasure Doctor."

They sipped their milk in silence, slowly making their way closer to each other until they were shoulder to shoulder. The Doctor was half way done with her cup before she slunk under the covers with a sigh. Yaz did the same. She felt a lot more sleepy than usual. She blamed it on the milk, but it had been a long time since she had had another person in her bed, and it was comforting.

Not like that. Yaz blushed at her own thoughts.

The lights dimmed all on their own. Feeling emboldened by the lack of lights, Yaz sunk closer to the Doctor. She didn't expect the Doctor to wrap her arms around her, putting her head on her chest.

Yaz tried her best to not let up how nervous she was. She tried to breathe deeply, knowing it probably wouldn't matter anyway.

She slid her fingers into the Doctor's hair, smirking when she heard her breath hitch.

"Yaz?" The Doctor whispered quietly, but the room was so silent it could have been a shout.

"Mmm?" Yaz hummed absentmindedly, still twirling the Doctor's hair between her fingers.

"Could you sing? Right now?"

Yaz's hands froze in the Doctor's hair.

"I mean, not unless you're okay with it- You know maybe, maybe, just forget I ever asked, this is nice, just this is nice-"

Yaz's voice was shaking when she began.

"Blue skies… Smiling at me… Nothing but blue skies do I see." She was trying to be quiet, but her voice almost boomed in the silence. She began twisting the Doctor's hair in her hands as gentle as she could, eliciting a sigh from the alien below her.

"Noticing the days hurrying by… When you're in love, my how they fly…" She trailed off, chancing a look at the Doctor, who had moved off of her chest in favor of lying beside her.

"Was that okay?" The stress of singing and the proximity between her and the Doctor was beginning to get to her, she just needed the reassurance.

The Doctor pressed both of her hands to Yaz's.

"It was _brilliant_." She breathed against Yaz's lips. She squeezed Yaz's hands in her own, and Yaz did the same to steady herself as the Doctor leaned in to kiss her.

"That good huh?" Yaz stammered against the Doctor's lips, and the Doctor nodded, moving her hands to tangle in Yaz's hair. Yaz wrapped her arms around the Doctor's middle, letting herself melt.

Yaz didn't know how long it had been. It could have been ten minutes or two hours and she couldn't tell. She had never been more content in her life, wrapped up in the Doctor's arms.

"Doctor?" Yaz whispered against the Doctors neck, making her shiver.

"Mhm?" The Doctor said into Yaz's hair.

"Can you sing?"

There was a pause, before the Doctor started singing something completely foreign. At first she thought it sounded Swedish, then French, then Japanese. After a while she realized it sounded like nothing she had ever heard before. It was like the words in the song were songs themselves.

"What do you think?" The Doctor mumbled once she was finished.

" _Brilliant._ " Yaz breathed, and fell swiftly asleep, the Doctor following soon after.


End file.
